Friend and Father
by angelicdamnation
Summary: In the bleak midwinter, a few weeks after the masked ball, Erik pays a visit to the grave of Christine's father.


**A/N: The idea for this came from a trip to Paris over the summer. I passed a cemetery in Montmartre and realized just how close it was to the Opéra...**  
 **Please let me know what you think! :)**

 **oOoOoOo**

The deep midwinter frost left the streets nearly deserted as the watery sun sank low in the sky, the slick arc-patterned cobblestones catching the dimming light. Small pockets of snow remained piled along the edges of the street, and the storm drains steamed in the cold. Bundled as they were against the chill, the few passers-by took little notice of the heavily-cloaked man making his way toward the Cimetière de Montmartre. Not that they could have taken much notice, of course, tall though he was. His face was nearly obscured by the brim of his hat and the scarf wound around his neck.

Beneath the nearby overhang of boarded-up shop, a homeless man and his young daughter were huddled against the frigid air. They instinctively shrank away from the cloaked man when he neared them, but were unwary of the franc coins that tumbled from his gloved hand as he passed them. He did not acknowledge the pair, nor the girl's quiet "Merci, m'sieur...", but instead continued briskly, rounding a corner.

The high stonework walls surrounding the cemetery were ensconced with ivy long since dead which bled onto the high iron gate of the entrance, and the sound of the frozen husks crackling as it opened drowned out its own low creak. With snow crunching beneath his shoes, the man closed the gate behind him.

Erik exhaled slowly, savoring the silence of the close air and the shelter from the wind that ghosted above him. Though the Opéra was relatively nearby, the dropping temperatures of the dying January day were enough to make even the like of him shiver.

As he began to walk along the winding path that led through the still heart of the cemetery, he took in the sight of the graves on either side of him. They were a mix of old and new stone in varying configuration and design, but nearly all of them were covered in the same blanket of wind-whipped snow and dead leaves, save for the few graves which were shielded by the collection of bare-limbed trees which were peppered throughout the enclosure. Of these, names were visible beneath the frost.

Offenbach, Maillart... Many musicians had been interred here over the years, several of them quite well known to the educated public. Their tombs were prominent and very decorated, evidence of their popularity and influence in their time.

The grave he had come to see, however, would have no such finery. It was unadorned.

Its inhabitant was as much a pauper as a musician, and the sole reason he had a place in the cemetery at all was by the good graces of his daughter's benefactor. Erik recalled Christine telling him, long ago, that Madame Valerius had used all the influence she had to secure a place for her father, little that it was. She had cried when she spoke of his funeral.

Far in front of him, a small mausoleum came into view from a bend in the path. The ashy color of the exterior nearly blended with the whitened backdrop of the border wall beyond, while its façade was made up of dark, mottled granite, separated into the various tombs of a communal sepulchre. The capstone of the otherwise plain structure bore a Celtic cross, carved in relief. Some of the spaces of the façade were engraved, while others were empty, having not yet encountered their permanent resident. One in particular, near the bottom, bore a small plaque, weathered from nearly four years in the elements.

"Daaé", it read simply, followed by the dates, "1832-1878".

He had found what he came for.

With a quick scrape of his foot, Erik brushed the snow from the steps of the mausoleum, and proceeded to sink down upon them, resting his back upon the column behind him. He sighed, and wrapped the cloak tighter around himself. A quick glance upward told him that the sun had almost completely set, and dark was approaching. He closed his eyes and bowed his head, then spoke softly.

"Monsieur Daaé-or, if I may, Gustave..." he cringed at the tremor in his voice, "...I have come to speak to you."

The wind picked up slightly, but as expected, there was no response. He continued on.

"I realize this is rather unorthodox, and in the spirit of honesty between fellow musicians, I recognize that given my faithless view of the world, I shouldn't believe that you can hear me...but Christine does," he breathed her name like a melody, "...She believes that you are listening and watching over her, and I find myself wanting to believe that is true."

Erik steeled himself, feeling an irrational nervousness prickle within him.

"You see, I would like to ask for Christine's hand in marriage," the wind increased its force and sent the unfrozen dead leaves nearby scuttling around the path of compacted snow, "I understand, of course, that I am hardly the man a father would want for his daughter, and yet, I want nothing more in the world than to spend my life making it up to her as her husband."

He opened his eyes, now, and took in the barren cemetery before him. Almost parallel to where he sat, a statue of an angel reached out a hand to him from across the path, as if beckoning him forward. The Latin inscription on its pedestal read, 'Venite ad me'.

Come to me.

With a sharp pang of guilt, Erik was reminded of the night he took Christine through the mirror, all the while playing upon his grand lie to her, calling himself the Angel of Music.

"If you can hear me now, Gustave, you must have heard me then, and there will never be enough words to express my shame in what I did," his throat tightened, though not because of the cold, "But you must understand: she needed someone. She was lost in the sea of her grief for you, and she needed someone to take her hand and pull her back to the shore. I will never understand what possessed me to lie to her as I did-perhaps fear that it was the only way to reach her-but I give you my word that it was done out of tenderness, not spite."

The wind died down, and the frigid air lost a bit of its sharpness.

"Christine was meant to soar, not to spend her life too deep in mourning to try." he said softly, no longer speaking to anyone in particular. He could see his breath, now. "All I wanted was to take her broken wings and teach her to fly...and in doing so, I fell in love with her. I fell in love with her voice and her eyes and her kindness, the way she would smile when she listened to music, the way she..." he faltered off with a sigh. "Despite all that I am and all that I will never be, I love Christine with all of my heart, and though everything may have gone wrong for her and I, I truly believe that in time, I can make her happy. I want to give her the life she used to wish for in her sleep, full of music and someone who cares deeply enough for her to show it."

Erik paused, and small, perfect flakes of snow began to fall all around him as the day slipped into night. With his heart thumping in his chest, he resumed speaking.

"I came to ask for your permission to marry Christine because there is no one she loves more than you, and someday, when the time is right, I want to propose to her knowing that the two men who care for her most in this world are united in believing that I am meant to make her happy. I am a man who makes many mistakes, and who will undoubtedly make more before my time on this earth draws to an end, but I promise you and the stars above us both that there will never be a day that I will not love Christine more than my own life, and the chance to bring her the happiness she deserves is an honor that I truly hope to be worthy of in your eyes."

Erik then rose to his feet carefully, with measured grace, and turned to face the mausoleum.  
"Long ago, after she discovered who it was that she called the Angel of Music, I heard her praying before she slept. She was speaking to you." A small smile played across the left side of Erik's face, distorting the symmetry of the mask. "She said that perhaps, I truly was the angel you promised to send her, and that I just needed her help to find my wings." He laughed softly, a musical sound that lost itself in the breeze. His voice took on an unexpected warmth.

"If it truly was your hand that led me to Christine, then you have my deepest gratitude. She has brought such light to my life, and if anything, she is _my_ Angel of Music."

Naturally, there was no answer or movement, save for the snowflakes that slowly whirled their way to the ground. Erik raised a gloved hand to remove the soft felt hat from his head, and sighed. "If you truly can hear me, know that whichever way our stories end, your daughter will always have a protector in me. We both watch over her, for we were both cut from the same star. By your leave, I would like the three of us to shine together."

From within the pockets of the cloak, he gingerly withdrew a single white rose, pure as the softly falling snow.

"Sleep well," he whispered, "and may your soul be at peace." He gently placed the rose at the top of the steps. The fresh snow around it melted.

Suddenly, Erik heard the distant, deadened shuffling of footsteps upon the sidewalk. He turned to face the cemetery, and saw that the streetlamps were being lit, one by one. The nearest of them blazed to life, casting new shadows around him. The statue of the angel was now lit from the back, and the rosy light behind it formed a halo around its perfect stonework curls. The light splayed across the outstretched hand, giving the marble the appearance of pale, flawless skin.

The reflection of the light upon the snow illuminated the inscription, 'Venite ad me'.

His grey eyes glistening in the twilight, he turned to face the mausoleum once more, heart leaping. "Thank you, Gustave," he whispered breathlessly.

oOoOoOo

Erik's mind was distant as he made his way from the cemetery, the graves falling behind him, not registering the crunch of snow and frozen grass beneath his shoes, nor the cacophony of the gate as he pushed it open.

Once in the street, he did, however, take a moment to close the iron gate with care, securing the hingebolt in place before turning to continue his trudge back to the Opéra, hoping to arrive before the evening's managerial meltdown concerning _Don Juan Triumphant_ had concluded.

The alley before him fell away with his long strides, and soon Erik was walking downhill in the main street, heeding neither the light gleaming from behind the shutters overhead nor the smell of woodsmoke and fresh pastry that dusted the air. He had just passed a row of wooden fencing, however, when he stopped. He heard a melody on the wind.

He turned on his heel, and walked slowly back up the sloped street. The sound became louder. He was approaching a row of old shops when he began to discern a huddled mass of rags, from which the melody was emanating. It was humming an old Normandy lullaby.

He drew close enough to see that it was the homeless man and his daughter. He had gathered her to his chest to keep her warm, rocking her slowly, and she was deeply asleep, lulled by his voice and exhausted by the cold. Though his eyes were closed, he seemed to sense Erik's approach, and tightened his embrace around the girl.

Blinking in spite of himself, he instinctively dropped to one knee next to the pair. The man's eyes opened, and his graying eyebrows rose in surprise as he took in the finery of Erik's clothing, juxtaposed by the mask, but he said nothing. Erik, in turn, furrowed his brow at the man's tattered clothing and dirt-stained skin that, he now noticed, was lightly shivering.

"Monsieur, the cold is no place for a man of your age, nor a girl of hers," he said quietly, so as not to wake the sleeping child. He reached into the pocket of his tailcoat and withdrew five 100-franc notes, which he placed in the man's quivering hand. His eyes filled with tears as he looked at Erik with an expression of utter shock, mouth gaping within his grizzled beard. "Find yourself someplace warm to stay, and something even warmer to eat," Erik said, helping the man to his feet.

The pair did not remind him of his own freezing nights as a homeless urchin on the streets, but rather of another father and his daughter, trying to find their way in the frigid world, having only each other to cling to.

Impulsively, he unwound the deep red scarf from around his neck and placed it around the girl's thin shoulders as her father held her to him with surprising strength.

"Monsieur, you...you must be an angel..." the man said, clasping Erik's hand as he withdrew it from the scarf. Erik's eyes flicked downward momentarily, and he stepped away from the man, pulling his hand back.

"Do you know the story of Little Lotte, monsieur?" Erik intoned quietly, wrapping his cloak around himself. The man shook his head in confusion. "Very well," Erik said with odd piety, "that is my price. With some of this money, you must find your way to the bouquinistes along the Seine, and purchasr a book of the legends of the North, and read the story of Little Lotte to your daughter. I...I think she will enjoy it." he concluded, somewhat lamely. Nonetheless, the man nodded, accepting his strange request and giving him a small smile that revealed surprisingly perfect teeth.

"Thank you, monsieur. May God bless you for your kindness." With that, the man and his sleeping daughter made their way down the street toward the lower neighborhood.

Erik shook his head at himself as he watched them go, but the corner of his lip twitched when he saw the man knock at a distant doorway, and be let in almost immediately, the undulating glow of a fire projected onto the opened door.

He sighed, no longer eager to return to the Opéra. The stars gleamed brightly above him, and something in his heart told him to climb.

The streets of the Butte de Monmartre became steeper as he rose farther, the buildings becoming increasingly spaced from each other. Finally, after fifteen minutes of walking,, he reached the apex of a street block and found himself facing the construction site of the new Basilica de Sacré Cœur. Though it was little more than a foundation, the marble platforms that rose before him were the highest spot in Paris.

Erik walked to the inlaid concrete steps at the base of the foundation, and sat down, disregarding the snow. The whole of Paris was stretched before him, twinkling in the evening glow of the stars and the soft moonlight which found its way through the thin clouds. From where he sat, he could see the Opéra, its copper dome illuminated and glimmering.

Though the patchwork expanse of the city twisted its tendrils of smoke and light toward his eyes, Erik's gaze remained fixed upon the place where he knew Christine to be, the place that housed so many feelings of triumph and longing for him.

In truth, though, the Opéra seemed small from where he sat. Insignificant in size and miniscule in comparison to the feelings he held in his heart. Nothing else really mattered except her, and the love that he so desperately wanted to give her.

Things were...unforgivably complex at the moment, but in time? Perhaps there might be light in the future. There was nothing in this world he wouldn't do for Christine, and in the end, she was what mattered. Not his opera, not the mask, not the wretched boy... Hopefully, in the end, he would have the chance to prove that to her. He promised Gustave he would keep her safe.

In the end, he would make whatever choice necessary to ensure it, no matter what it was.

The air was brisk, but full of life, free from the smog of the city. From where he sat, everything was manageable.

Erik breathed in deeply, and looked at the stars.

For now, his soul was at peace.


End file.
